From Deseret News archives:
'Russia' history questionable
An expansive work of scholarship, "Russia," by Philip Longworth, is a history of Russia covering the crucial political figures, such as Ivan the Terrible, Peter the Great and Josef Stalin, and views them in the light of recent documents.
The author, an experienced British historian educated at Oxford, discusses the consistent tendency of Russian leaders to colonize and conquer, including the Soviet state of recent years.
Most interesting for contemporary readers is his treatment of modern leaders, i.e. Stalin, a mass murderer who, Longworth says, "used the Communist Party as an established church." One controversial claim is that the Cold War could have been avoided if the Marshall Plan (established by the Truman Administration after World War II) had not been designed in a way that was unacceptable to the Soviet Union.
While most historians have been kind to Gorbachev, Longworth believes he "was unlucky and uncautious," ignored economic reforms and was eventually "overwhelmed by a rush of events and by successive crises." Thus he fails to credit Gorbachev for his important role in ending the Cold War.
As for Yeltsin, Longworth dismisses him as a leader who served the interests of the United States better than he did the interests of Russia. Moreover, he "broke trust with the Russian people." Yeltsin was eventually defeated by his bad health and alcoholism.
Longworth also deals with Russia's current leader, Vladimir Putin, formerly leader of the KGB, whom he praises. "Displaying a clear sense of strategic realities and steadiness in the pursuit of his priorities, Putin was quick to appreciate opportunities and skillful in exploiting them. Unlike Yeltsin, he was concerned with realities, not gestures."
According to the author, Putin demonstrated that "managed democracy was working," even if it failed to meet modern constitutional political standards. Nonetheless, it was "no worse a travesty than the American presidential election of 2000 had been, and even American businessmen in Russia preferred Putin's careful authoritarianism to anarchic rule by oligarchs and mafias."
While a useful history, Longworth's study gives too much credit to Putin, whom many historians today believe is leading Russia back toward the dictatorial sins of Stalin. Almost every decision Putin has made — controlling the press, pushing out political leaders who disagree with him, failing to protect people from oppression — points to a totalitarian state led by an iron man who lacks integrity.
E-mail: dennis@desnews.com
